New series alert: Ops Quickies — snackable episodes on tech, tools, and systems. 🍿

We're kicking off with a big question wrapped in The Clunkiest Acronym: what the heck is a PSA ... or professional services automation platform?

Harv explains why the name’s a problem, what this kind of platform actually does, and why service businesses need to start paying attention.

If you've got any questions about ops tech, PSAs, or Scoro, drop me a message on LinkedIn. I'd love to hear from you – and might even turn it into a mini episode.

And if you know someone who needs this explainer, forward it on and ask them to give it a listen.

Your ops might be ticking along just fine.

But what if your founder got sick tomorrow? What if your top client left? What if you had to make a big decision with zero visibility on the numbers?

You might not be planning to sell your agency – but you should run it like you are.

Because when you adopt that mindset, you zoom out. You stop firefighting. You start building a business that runs without you.

This week on The Handbook, Harv sits down with Sam Wood – fractional COO and founder of consultancy Ottesu – to talk about how agencies and consultancies can apply board-level thinking without needing to set up an actual board.

Because a business that’s sale-ready is a business that’s well run.

In this episode, Sam breaks down the five areas every agency should be reviewing regularly – whether you’re building to exit or just want better control of the ship.

Here’s what we get into:

• Why applying board-level thinking doesn’t mean setting up a boardroom – and how to start
• How to define and operationalize strategy (it’s not just a slide in onboarding)
• Why culture starts with leadership behavior (not beers and pizza)
• How to build capability and resilience so your business doesn’t depend on heroics
• How to reduce risk and spot gaps in capability before they break you
• The one performance metric every service business should be tracking if they want to be profitable

Whether you're an ops lead or MD, this one’s packed with practical ways to futureproof your agency.

Additional Resources:

Follow Sam Wood on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sam-wood-gaicd-9023a54a/

Check out Ottesu’s website: https://ottesu.com.au/

Follow Harv on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harvnagra

Stay up to date with regular ops insights. Subscribe to The Handbook: The Operations Newsletter.

This podcast is brought to you by Scoro, where you can manage your projects, resources and finances in a single system.

Is your business growing, but it still feels messy?

This solo episode from Harv looks back at one year of The Handbook podcast, and it’s a big one. Harv recaps what he’s learned from a year of speaking with ops leaders across the agency world. He packages it all into one whirlwind tour of the five core pillars of operational maturity: people, process, tools, data, and growth.

If you’ve missed a few episodes (or want a cheat code to benchmark your agency’s ops maturity), this is your starting point. Or your reset.

Here’s what Harv dives into:

• Why operational maturity, not creativity or client relationships, is the biggest differentiator for scale
• What smart people practices actually look like, from efficient and effective hiring to career path frameworks
• How to build a sales engine that doesn’t rely on panicked effort or founder charisma
• Why a tech stack is only as good as the strategy underneath it
• What it really means to be data-driven, beyond just dashboards
• And what common agency growth mistakes still trip up even the most ambitious teams

Plus, you’ll hear key takeaways from guests like Manish Kapur, Karl Sakas, Preston Chandler, Jenny Plant, and many more.

Additional Resources:

• Harv’s webinar on documentation & best practice here: https://youtu.be/RroxOVlSwIk
• Learnings and tools from Freia Muehlenbein's 'how to pitch' episode: https://www.scoro.com/blog/how-to-pitch-a-client/

Follow Harv on LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/harvnagra

Stay up to date with regular ops insights. Subscribe to The Handbook: The Operations Newsletter: https://www.scoro.com/podcast/#handbook

This podcast is brought to you by Scoro, where you can manage your projects, resources and finances in a single system.